Today I was treated with a nice tour of temples and shrines in the greater Tokyo area thanks to blog reader “Johnl”, who has lived there for a while and knows a lot of inside stuff. I took yet more pictures, which I am uploading onto the blog along with stuff from Kyoto/Nara, but to give you a preview, here’s what we did:
- Visited the Yushima Tengangū Shrine where I finally got to pay respects to a fellow scholar, and enjoy good atmosphere.
- Visited numerous temples and shrines in Ueno Park, including the famous Kannon-dō.
- Visited a shrine for Benzaiten near Ueno Park, along with getting some great photos.
- Visited Takahata Temple, devoted to Fudō Myōō, where I saw a Shingon “goma” ritual for the first time. Pretty amazing.
I’ll post more about these once I get pictures uploaded especially about the first and last items with both earn a post each. It was an awesome day, and by the end, I was beat, but greatly satisfied. The trip covered many disparate things I wanted to see all in one day, plus the weather was just perfect.
Thanks again John for the excellent tour!
Namu Amida Butsu
Hello, this blog is about my life as a father, Buddhist and Japanophile / Koreaphile. Any useful information I can pass along will hopefully make the 
Well, it was nice for me, too! Getting to meet Doug in person, and also visiting some temples where I wanted to get stamps put in my album. I also didn’t know that shrines, not only temples, will also stamp your book.
Anyone else coming to Japan, feel free to contact me! (Maybe Doug could forward a message or something.)
JL
Thanks again, John.
For anyone else, definitely take up his offer if you can.